19/11/2019 - Tremors all round
Introduction Our tale begins in the bustling trade city of Merchendale, in the year 2020 PB, where a group of intrepid adventures have just returned after several months travelling on business. The group, having just collected their significant pay for said business, now had a rare free week in Merchendale’s Lower City to do with as they pleased… Delta-split The first job of the group was to decide what they wanted to do with their current freedom. After a quick run-in and eventual healing of a diseased man, the group decided to perform a classic delta split manoeuvre. The more alcoholic of the group, namely Rowan, Unit and Corus , decided that despite it being only 10:00 am, drinking and gambling was what was called for! So off they went to the Tricksy Talisman, the largest casino / tavern in the City. On arrival, they were rudely stopped by the Talisman bouncers, who firmly requested that they deposit their weapons at the weapon depot. Rowan and Unit quickly acquiesced to this request. However, Corus , keen not to part from his staff, tried to deceive the bouncers into believing that he needed it for walking. The bouncers, clearly ‘moved’ by his ‘incredible’ attempts at deception, passed him a broomstick and politely requested that he either deposit his staff or bugger the heck off. The three eventually made it passed the bouncers and into the Tavern, where they immediately ran into an old friend, Melissa, a Ship’s Captain that they had sailed with before. She quickly challenged Rowan to an intense luck-insight-based drinking game, where the first to vomit had to buy the other and their companion’s drinks for the day. Rowan lost. But Mellissa did vomit all over Unit when he play-punched her in the stomach. So everyone won really. To the orphanage, part 1 Whilst this was occurring, the more philanthropic of the group, namely Nika , Gawdnus and Khathraa, made their way to the Safewell Orphanage, an establishment that the group had supported for many years. On their arrival, the three of them were accosted by the very happy and playful orphans, before Eiranna, the Halfling who runs the orphanage, invited them in for a chat. However, the group quickly realised that Eiranna was not her normal chatty self, and that much of the furniture within the orphanage was missing. After some persuasive chat from Khathraa and Nika , Eiranna broke down and told them that two of the recently come-of-age orphan twins, Jacob and Darren, had ran into major trouble. She outlined how the twins had got involved with one of the minor crime gangs within the City and had somehow managed to steal from, and subsequently be caught by, the powerful Venusto Mafia . She explained that the Venusto’s were now demanding she pay them 40,000 GP by tomorrow, else the twins would be executed and their bodies dumped in front of the orphanage. Khathraa, with his connections to the Venusto’s , promised that the group would do all they could to help negotiate the twins safe release. Khathraa also quickly passed some money to Eiranna and asked that she continue to care for a specific young girl. And with that, the three of them made their way to the Tricksy Talisman –which as well as being a casino/tavern was well known as the headquarters of the Venusto’s . Thanks to Khathraa’s connections, he, Nika and Gawdnus were able to enter the Talisman without surrendering their weapons. On entering, they found Rowan and Unit table-dancing with Melissa and her crew, whilst Corus appeared to be manically writing in his notebook. After calming down the dancing drunkards, Khathraa et al., outlined what happened at the orphanage. After much discussion, the group decided that Khathraa and Nika would seek audience with the leaders of the Venusto’s , whist Corus , Rowan and Gawdnus would use Corus’s arcane eye to spy on the dungeons beneath the Talisman. Unit just kept on gambling. Legend. Thumbs Thanks to his connections, Khathraa was able to persuade some Venusto agents to allow him and Nika an impromptu meeting with Vanessa and Vasilis Venusto, “The Siblings”, who lead the Mafia. After some tense discussion between Khathraa and the ever-arrogantly-smiling Vasilis , things appeared to be getting nowhere. However, the ever-glaring-never-speaking Vanessa whispered something to Vasilis , at which point he grinned horribly, and commanded his guards to bring the twins up to him. Downstairs, whilst using his Arcane eye to identify dozens of guards in the dungeons beneath, Corus watched as two guards entered the dungeons, grabbed two young looking men, and then marched them back up the stairs. Commanding his eye to follow, Corus watched as the twins were brought before Vasilis , Vanessa , Khathraa and Nika . Vasilis , still smiling, told the trembling twins that Khathraa and Nika had successfully secured their release without pay, but that before they could leave they must have their thumbs removed as a reminder to others not to cross the Venusto’s . Already horrified by this, Khathraa and Nika were further horrified when Vasilis turned to them, passed them a knife each, and told them that they must be the ones to remove their thumbs… A bad case of the shakes As Vasilis outlined his cruel conditions, one of the boys, Darren, began shaking and backing away. In contrast, his brother Jacob bravely told Khathraa to do it, as having no thumbs was better than being dead! Realising he had little choice, Khathraa raised the knife, prepared to do the deed, when suddenly, out of nowhere, the floor began to shake… Just a bit at first, before suddenly a huge tremor shook the entire building. Upstairs, Jacob and Darren were thrown across the room into the wall, whilst downstairs Corus and Gawdnus were flung to the ground. The shaking briefly subsided before, without warning, a second even bigger tremor ripped through the building. This time, the building did not withstand the impact well. Everyone watched as if in slow motion as two huge beams holding up the first floor collapsed onto the ground floor. Downstairs, Gawdnus, who had sort refuge under a table, was unable to evade the beam and screamed as her lower body was completely crushed. The others just about managed to avoid the beam, but still took significant damage from falling debris. Upstairs, Vasilis and Vanessa did a classic teleport-escape, whilst Khathraa was flung into the hole left by the collapsed beams, barely managing to hold onto some wood to prevent himself from falling down. By this point, fire caused by spilt oil lamps had begun to rage across the building, smoke was filling the room, and the only door out of the Talisman was completely blocked…